I told the family who commissioned this cabinet for their music room that I aim for five hundred year's life span. Some of the details that enable that longevity include frame & panel doors with mortise & tenon construction and floating panel. Dovetails provide rigid vertical horizontal structure, and the drawer stops are built behind the drawer so that the drawers can be slammed shut without stressing the drawer (now, boys, don't take me too literally!) I added details of book-matched door panels cut from one thick piece of cherry, and ebony inlays in the hand-carved pulls. The top is not attached rigidly on purpose -- it must be left free to expand and contract with humidty changes. A nice piece of furniture will pass, hopefully, through many generations.
